


Parent-Teacher Conference

by carmenta



Category: Coldfire Trilogy - C. S. Friedman
Genre: AU, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-20
Updated: 2010-12-20
Packaged: 2017-10-13 21:10:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/141754
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/carmenta/pseuds/carmenta
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Raising teenagers is difficult enough. Raising one who's a step ahead of everyone else as far as evolution is concerned is another matter altogether.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Parent-Teacher Conference

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Trobadora](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trobadora/gifts).



Mes Cowley watched across the rim of her spectacles as Damien took a seat on the chair on the other side of her tidy desk, her folded hands resting on a stack of students’ exercise books in front of her.

“Thank you for coming, Ser Vryce,” she said, and the tone in itself was enough to make Damien feel as if he were about to get his ears blistered for some wrongdoing. That she was two heads shorter than him and probably half his weight didn’t change that in any way.

He’d faced scarier sights, he reminded himself. It didn’t help much.

“Jenseny passed on your message, but she was not very specific why you wanted to see me,” he said. The scene had brought back memories of his own time as a student, and of notes from teachers he’d brought home. He didn’t think Jenseny could have gotten up to anything nearly that bad, but then again, circumstances were unique where she was concerned.

Mes Cowley sighed quietly. “Jenseny is a very nice girl,” she said, “but a little different at times.”

Just like anyone would be who’d grown up isolated from all but a handful of people, who’d seen her father killed, who’d been kidnapped by insane children, who’d been dragged onto a desperate journey after that. Who’d almost been killed by flesh-eating trees and demons and who’d slit her own throat in order to take down a practically immortal sorcerer and barely survived. Who’d then been dragged on another journey, chasing after a Iezu across rivers, mountains and up a live volcano, only to end up in the middle of a Church crusader attack on the Hunter’s Keep. And all that wasn’t taking even into account her current living arrangements. In comparison, the worst her new classmates had ever experienced probably ranged on the level of chasing after an escaped horse. ‘Different’ was putting it mildly.

“Is there a problem with her?” Damien asked. He was still convinced that putting her into a normal school was the best thing to do, no matter how much Gerald had argued against the idea. She needed contact to her peer group, and social interaction with more than an ex-priest and a formerly undead ex-Hunter, but they all had known that it wasn’t going to be easy, not when Jenseny was not exactly adept at dealing with people. She’d promised to do her best, though, and for two months it seemed to have worked. Gerald had wagered that the first trouble would come after three weeks at the most.

Damien would have to remember to collect his winnings; he’d been confident that she’d last at least twice that, especially after he’d mentioned the bet to her.

Mes Cowley picked up a single sheet of paper from her desk. “Jenseny has a very active imagination,” she said, scanning the text. Even upside down, Damien recognised Jenseny’s sharp, pointy handwriting. “Some of the ideas she comes up with in her writing exercises...”

“If it’s about creative writing, I don’t see the issue,” Damien said. “We’re encouraging her to learn and to read, so of course she’ll use those ideas.” Though perhaps he ought to remind her that what she saw as normal - and what Gerald presented to her as normal - might not count as such for regular people. Regular people did not hide under their pillow in the morning while claiming to be unable to go to school because the sunlight was too loud. Or rather, they might try but usually they weren’t actually telling the truth.

“Her writing classes are not the issue, though I would encourage her to take a more realistic approach.” Mes Cowley pointed the pen in her hand at one of the paragraphs of Jenseny’s text. “Are you aware that she is making up new demons?” she asked. “She calls them Iezu, and she seems convinced that they exist.”

Of course she would, when Karril was a regular visitor and occasionally brought others along. And then there was Riven, who had developed a downright unhealthy fascination with Gerald and who was going to find out sooner or later that you didn’t irritate the one man on this planet who’d ever sent a Iezu to hell. Gerald might no longer be the Hunter, or anything beyond a mere human adept, but that didn’t make him any less dangerous. It just meant that he had to be more subtle about it all.

“None of them have shown up here, have they?” Damien asked somewhat apprehensively. He was not sure how to explain sudden quasi-divine attention for Jenseny away.

Mes Cowley shook her head. “No, and the school sorcerer thinks that Jenseny isn’t about to manifest anything, but it’s still dangerous. She should know better than to write about new demons, that’s only going to cause trouble. If she were a fae positive...”

She really couldn’t be called that. Labelling her a fae positive would be like calling the Novatlantic Ocean a puddle. Gerald was growing more and more convinced that Jenseny presented the next step of human evolution on this planet, and Damien had to agree with him on that. Still, even evolutionary progress wasn’t going to keep her from attending to class, so they’d have to talk to her about being more careful and not letting her imagination run wild. Otherwise, other things might run wild too, soon.

“We’ll make sure she knows not to be too creative in her stories,” Damien promised.

Mes Cowley gave him an approving look. “That would be good. I know that you and Ser Tarrant do your best, and that it cannot be easy for two knights like you to adopt and raise a child.”

Blatant fishing for information, and Damien didn’t have any trouble not to give in. What was he supposed to tell her, anyway? _Yes, we’re raising her because I like her and Gerald isn’t about to let her out of his sight before he hasn’t found out all about the solar fae he can?_ The man needed a new hobby anyway, now that he had returned to the living and was no longer terrorising entire continents. Damien figured it was safer to let him monitor and examine Jenseny’s receptiveness for the solar fae than a lot of other things which might catch his interest. Most of the time he was focused on his Iezu research anyway; Jenseny’s abilities were more of a distraction during his free time.

“The Order of the Golden Flame has always offered protection to those who need it,” he said instead. “We were the ones to rescue Jenseny from a difficult situation, and it seemed best to keep her with us.” It certainly would not have been safe to put her anywhere else at the time, what with her being barely capable of handling the company of other humans and with Calesta coming after them all. Taking her along on the mad dash to Mount Shaitan had been a move of sheer desperation, but leaving her behind would not have been an option when she’d been terrified at the slightest hint of losing sight of the last two people she knew in this world. She’d demonstrated that well enough when they’d run into Andrys Tarrant at the Hunter’s Keep and the mere thought of him killing Gerald had been enough to send her into hysterics strong enough to make Andrys back down.

Admittedly, seeing Jenseny in a full-fledged, fae-enhanced panic attack probably was enough to make stronger men than him shut up. It had only taken Andrys a few moments to come to the realisation that if Gerald was dead, he might be the one who had to deal with Jenseny. The idea had been enough to convince him that letting Gerald live presented certain advantages.

“I am sure Jenseny will adjust to her family situation,” Mes Cowley tried again. Damien ignored her, and not just because the idea of himself, Jenseny and Gerald as family was simply too weird to consider.

“Are there any other issues with her?” he asked. “We thought she was doing fine, her results so far looked promising.”

Mes Cowley picked up another sheet of paper. “Some of the other teachers have left notes for me,” she said. “Apparently Mer Havisham - he teaches the natural sciences - has expressed some confusion about her remarks when the class worked on their chemistry theory. Is it true that Jenseny has learned to use firearms?”

“Yes,” Damien said curtly. He still wasn’t happy about that particular development, especially about Gerald’s deadpan _if she can’t use a gun, would you rather I teach her about swordfighting to defend herself?_ The man was right, but that didn’t mean that Damien had to like it.

Sighing, Mes Cowley scribbled something on the paper. “And then there’s biology.”

Giving her a wary look, Damien waited.

“They’re studying anatomy these weeks and she’s very good at it, especially the practical parts,” Mes Cowley continued, “so good, in fact, that Mer Havisham wonders whether she’s been... practising.”

“If you’re asking whether we let her dissect animals in her free time...”

“No, no,” Mes Cowley waved off hastily. “I’m sure you and Ser Tarrant would not do that.”

Hopefully not, Damien thought darkly, but he wasn’t convinced that Jenseny’s apparent surgical skills stemmed solely from the fact that her unique vision probably gave her an advantage in knowing where and how to place the knife.

“We wouldn’t, no,” he said. “We are trying to provide her with a thorough education, but cutting up small animals isn’t part of that.” And it wasn’t necessary in any way, either. Damien was beginning to teach her Healing - usually with Gerald in the room, pretending to be occupied with something entirely different and not because he was catching up on the one area of sorcery he hadn’t dabbled in for nine centuries - and Jenseny knew well enough how to look inside a living organism without needing a scalpel. “As I said, she’s had a difficult time behind her, but we are doing our best.”

Reassuring school teachers. In a way, it was more difficult to do that than sail halfway around the world to eliminate a new species of demons, with nobody but a rakh woman and an undead former prophet by your side. At least with demons, you knew what you were dealing with.

“It’s not usual for knights of your order to raise children, is it?” Mes Cowley asked. “Have you and Ser Tarrant done this before?”

Well, Gerald had been a family man and seemed fairly good with children, at least until you remembered what he’d done to his own. For that very reason, the first thing Damien had done once it had looked as if Jenseny was going to survive was to extract a promise from him that she’d not know any harm by his hand. A necessary precaution at the time, and Damien was just glad he’d managed to get that done before Gerald could figure out that Damien had given Jenseny’s rescue a higher priority than that of the Hunter, and that this was why he’d made intimate acquaintances with the sunlight on the Undying Prince’s rooftop terrace. He tended to be oddly irrational about that sort of thing, even when he’d been back to his usual pale and demonic self within a week thanks to Damien’s liberal and not always voluntary donations of blood. These days, at least, Gerald only bit him when invited to, and not out of hunger. It made life with him considerably easier.

“I’m new at it, though I’ve been training youngsters in sorcery for a while now,” Damien said eventually. “Gerald’s the one with hands-on experience.” Though even he was flummoxed at times by the intricacies of dealing with Jenseny. Handling a teenager was hard enough. That she held adept-level powers didn’t make it any easier, though Gerald at least could relate to that. But even the former Hunter seemed confused at times about what to do with someone who claimed to be able to taste sounds.

“It would have been good if Ser Tarrant had been able to come as well.” Mes Cowley put the sheet of paper down on the desk, and Damien felt a quiet pang of relief now that it didn’t seem immediately threatening anymore.

“We’ve divided responsibilities,” he said. “School is my area.” Which was all for the best, because Damien did not want to imagine what would happen if anyone told Gerald that Jenseny was not normal or adapted enough. He might still pretend that he barely tolerated her, but there was a lot of proprietary interest invested in her from his side. Damien didn’t like it much that she was occasionally regarded as a pet project, but he consoled himself that at least he knew Gerald took very good care of his experiments and subjects of research.

Mes Cowley nodded. “Perhaps not the worst arrangement,” she said. “Well then, Ser Vryce... as I said, Jenseny is a good girl, but there are some areas where we’re wondering. I understand that she’s had a difficult time lately, and she’s very willing to please, but you do need to talk to her about her... oddities. Mes Sanders says that Jenseny’s drawings in art class sometimes are disturbing, and you know that the Church sends a priest every week for religious education... we’ve had three new ones ever since Jenseny joined us at the beginning of the year. Usually they last longer than that.”

Damien blinked. “How so?”

“Apparently they all feared giving the children homework because of what Jenseny would hand in.”

Damien suddenly remembered that Gerald had seemed oddly interested in helping Jenseny with her school assignments lately, and some things were beginning to make a little more sense there. He’d have to talk to him about irritating priests. Not everybody was as immune as Damien when it came to arguing with the Prophet, after all.

“I’ll take care of that,” he promised. “Is there anything else?”

Mes Cowley looked at her written notes once more. “Well, Mer Sommers reported that in geography Jenseny insisted that she’s from the continents east of Novatlantis, but we all know that can’t be true,” she said. “So I don’t think we need to concern ourselves with that when it’s just another sign of her vivid imagination.”

Damien sighed. “Just so,” he murmured, trying to figure out exactly how that was supposed to work. He considered himself lucky already that Jenseny had remembered not to mention anything about the solar fae or the events in Mercia, or the fact that she was currently being tutored in sorcery by the former Hunter and Prophet of the Law. Keeping her from mentioning anything strange altogether... wasn’t going to happen, and they weren’t going to try.

 _Let them wonder about her_ , he thought. _Let them wonder._


End file.
